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“They gave me write ups and they told me I need to take the color out of my hair. And they said I couldn’t have blonde in my hair because I’m black. They specifically said ‘black women don’t have blonde in their hair, so you need to take it out,’”

Johnson’s attorney, Jessica Weber said the main issue here is that the standards aren’t applied across the board.

“What’s wrong is that both federal and state law clearly say employers can’t impose two separate and distinct rules governing employee standards–one for African-American employees and one for everyone else. And that’s clearly what Hooters did here,”

Hooter declined comment. The case is now in the hands of Maryland Commission on Civil Rights and their investigation could take months.

I'm thinking the attorney has seen them. Surely an attorney wouldn't suggest pressing forward with discrimination charges if they didn't have evidence to support it. At least I would hope not.

Quoting romalove:

I'd love to see the actual write ups.

If the story is as told, of course it is discrimination.

Attorneys do that kind of thing all the time.

They find ways to invalidate, or try to invalidate, what is said.

And honestly, sometimes the write ups are doctored or otherwise suspect.

I once had a boss (I was 17 at the time, fresh out of high school) who was gay and closeted. I found out he was gay and he knew I found out. I didn't tell anyone and didn't discuss it and had no intention of talking about it, but I think it scared him (we worked for a prestigious private bank on Wall Street). This was 1980, times were a bit different than now.

Anyway, he started to periodically call me into his office to ask me to do something different than before, like "instead of filing the intakes in these folders, I think we should put them into this box here". That kind of thing.

Then he would do a write up, without my knowledge, about how he had to call me into his office to straighten out my work.

After two months of this, he fired me.

His boss, who liked me very much, actually called me at home and wanted to know what happened. I told him what I knew, and he sent me a month's severance, even though I had only been there for about four months.

I was lucky that man knew and liked me and understood. Not everyone would be in that position.

So, when these things come up, I take them with ten grains of salt, and then have a nice margarita....

It's nice that he sent you a month's severance pay, but how about rehiring you and then firing the jerk of a manager who baited you into doing things wrong so he could fire you? That was totally not cool.

My second thought is yes, this does sound like discrimination. However, if she received a company code of appearance and conduct when she was hired, and it states in that book, clearly, that she cannot color her hair, then she she broke a stated rule. This is tricky though, I would bet that the appearance guidelines state "No unnatural hair colors". Blonde and red are natural colors, just not usually for her race. This is one of those weird grey areas.

I've got blonde hair-well highlights and all my children have blonde in their hair too. The older I get, the more blonde I see-LOL. That whole "no unnatural hair colors" bit in dress codes always gets me and I work in HR

Quoting ReadWriteLuv:

My first thought is, who would sue to keep a Hooters job?

My second thought is yes, this does sound like discrimination. However, if she received a company code of appearance and conduct when she was hired, and it states in that book, clearly, that she cannot color her hair, then she she broke a stated rule. This is tricky though, I would bet that the appearance guidelines state "No unnatural hair colors". Blonde and red are natural colors, just usually for her race. This is one of those weird grey areas.

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